The energy I want to bring to my final half day of @yimbytown.bsky.social
People need purpose Catholic, econ Founder Emeritus YIMBYsOfNoVA.org Helped end SF-only zoning in ARL & ALX, VA lucagattonicelli.substack.com Love thy neighbor
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The energy I want to bring to my final half day of @yimbytown.bsky.social
First, huge thanks and congrats to Sen. @scottwiener.bsky.social. Without his dogged persistence and desire to work with his colleagues and address their reasonable concerns, we never would have made it. 2/x
Congratulations!!!!!
By a single yes vote, including three of the body’s 10 Republicans
i got a message for burger kings: hide
my one public (for now :)) reflection from attending the Abundance 2025 conference last week is that i met a lot of medium-to-mostly-offline people who have a very positive view of what they're trying to accomplish (more housing, more transit, more clean energy, etc)
Each alleged mass shooter is even more On the Computer All the Time than the previous one. Probably nothing to worry about there
This is truly a chef's kiss analogy
The Awful Effects of Velocipeding ca. 1890s
“This infrastructure is inappropriate for our community because it will have unacceptable impacts on (insert reason here).” “We cannot have any housing growth because we do not have the infrastructure necessary to support it.” Rinse and repeat!
“Norms’ importance and preciousness are hard for us to grasp while they shield us.”
I want to let you all know that the option to keep your mouth shut is available to you.
Don't shoot people. It's wrong and can also lead to a lot of bad things happening.
settings > content & media > autoplay video & gifs = off
It is incredibly simple to acknowledge that violence in any form is awful and erodes society.
Condemning another absolutely disgraceful act of gun violence. My thoughts & prayers are w/ Charlie Kirk & his family in this terrible moment & we are all grateful for first responders who immediately jumped into action. We must categorically reject all violence in our society.
folks, I've never lived through years of mass political violence but I do study it for a living: you don't want to live through years of political violence.
Political violence disproportionately hurts people with less power, not people with more power. Political violence will disproportionately hurt people of color and women and LGBTQ people. It’s not fair, but that’s the way it works. Celebrating political violence means at best indifference to that.
It seems like we're experiencing a sort of rerun of the political violence of the 1960s—except this time we have the internet cooking everyone's brains. None of this leads anywhere good.
The video is NFSL don’t recommend
Political violence is bad.
The attack on Charlie Kirk is disgusting, vile, and reprehensible. In the United States of America, we must reject political violence in EVERY form.
As I sometimes tell my teenage daughter, "No one has ever regretted not posting."
It is solvable! Unfortunately my advice is basically win the turnout battle and shift perception
We're really close to completely surrounding the California Governor's Mansion with five-over-ones.
This is legitimately great and I will show it to my kids one day
People question whether building more housing can lower prices, but I think it’s useful to flip that around and ask: are you saying that you can block housing without pushing up prices? Is that plausible? Can I block the production of other goods or services with no effect on prices?
🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
RHNA was (admittedly) a toothless failure for decades. Adding teeth now for monitoring & enforcement requires enormous resources (staff + $) from HCD. Does that mean a simpler, cheaper housing targets program in another state wouldn’t be effective? I have no idea.
Housing markets rely heavily on access to capital (loans to build, acquire, upgrade, & sell property). So it's critical to have stable, well-functioning financial systems that operate under transparent, consistently enforced rules. Messing with central banks can have big ripple effects for housing.
Jenny, you would not believe how many times I heard it in the erstwhile liberty movement (in a good way)
Eli Dourado: everyone agrees that the academic journal system is broken but no one has the incentive to create something better. (Hard co-sign!)
We need cheap rent so idiosyncratic weirdos can make a living pursuing their passions.
New policy goal: Bats in your backyard
Demand state-level housing reform! (Full disclosure: Poll commissioned by grassroots political movement I played some small part in starting in our fair commonwealth.)
That's what I heard from a think tanker there, you're right
You know that the housing crisis is bad in a small state like Utah when it makes the national news. Also interesting that NPR picked Utah for a story on state zoning preemption because the state has been very timid when it comes to state intervention
If only there was some kind of grassroots political movement trying to reduce housing prices
Let me go buy a Navy jacket with brass buttons, maybe I could infiltrate them
When we fix this housing thing I will go back to school to get a landscape architecture degree and spend my later years doing urban design and skatepark planning.
Supposedly these things can go up to 1.5 miles. Read about the sport Snow snake in a book called "A Native American Thought of It: Amazing Inventions and Innovations."
1/ The latest from Factory Seconds, @lucagattonicelli.bsky.social drives multiple minivans and discovers that all new cars are not, in fact, good. Most motorists only have chance encounters with unfamiliar vehicles, so many operate with imperfect information when comparing different ones.
Leet subscribers of Substack
Who was looking for compost drop off in ALX? Was it @alexgoyette.bsky.social ? Anyway Mom’s compost bins are back in #chirilagua #Arlandria Arlandria
Awesome, thanks!
Pepper applied!
California environmental groups
![Anakin/Padmé meme. Anakin: CEQA isn't the obstacle to infill homebuilding, exclusionary zoning is. Padmé, smiling: So you want to upzone in infill areas? Anakin: [Blank stare] Padmé: So ... you want to upzone in infill areas?](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:qnyq7wies2uc56bzqmfz4q25/bafkreibhm54pzou5xapzlsqo4r3mpqtyfuntzjiccliy64n5giukn3qmfm@jpeg "Click to view full size")
How would you protect a pumpkin plant from squirrels? Can I just buy something at Home Depot?
Forgive me, is this an AI picture?
A good read
Congratulations!!!!
ITS 4 IN THE MORNING AND I JUST BECAME A DAD
Do you know if the Chirilagua location still had compost bins by the dumpsters recently?
This kiosk was pretty helpful though the opening was very small and I got a little messy
That is my last resort
They took the bins away recently, maybe they are back!
Thanks for your helpful feedback, especially at this early hour
Sorry to ask this again, ALX folks, or Arlington folks, where can we drop off compost today? Our situation is dire lol
If only there were some charismatic internet poster dedicated to this issue
The Nonnas restaurant, though I think it is often booked up.
Duke Street land use pop-ups
This is why high quality sewer infrastructure is so important
Kiddo got a smart watch and a typewriter for her 8th birthday and she is way more excited about the typewriter
Yeah man, I get it, I am center-right and use housing advocacy to blend in to progressive spaces like Bluesky
From YIMBY Action
Help
Free kid art table, want more room for bikes! www.facebook.com/marketplace/...
Sitting twenty feet from former mayor "what about the trees?"
An older gentleman at Costco yesterday made sure I knew that he liked my Legalize Housing tee shirt
Seeking recommendations for a professional service to wall-mount large bookshelf speakers and a stereo receiver. Want to put our sound system back into service without waiting for all of our kids to grow up, thanks so much!
This is not how I wanted left-of-center folks to embrace concerns about tariffs and federal debt but I will take it.
Poor taste
all caps, no brake
**INSERT FAKE SHOCKED FACE HERE** ctmirror.org/2025/07/08/l...
“Community groups have long tried to address homelessness in the LA park. Workers with a St. John’s Community Health street medicine clinic that was serving homeless people said agents pointed guns at them & instructed them to stop their work & leave.”
I hear the city is gearing up for public comment on lane redesign and safety improvements for Braddock Road. My first email to @justindotnet.bsky.social, before starting YIMBYs of NoVA, was about that. I cannot wait to participate. One lane each way for cars would be fine. It is never congested.
I got Assi brand Udon noodles. I had Jia Jang before, which are thicker and Chinese.
LA Mart was just the ticket, thank you!
Where can I buy rice noodles suitable for ramen in or near Alexandria's lovely west end?
Great podcast interview of @buffywicks.bsky.social and the one and only @scottwiener.bsky.social. Thank you both for your courageous leadership!
"Lack of hope." Definitely a lot of that in LA. My wife and I reluctantly left the city earlier this year. Everyone I met there has either already done the same, or or will soon do. Why? I have a few ideas that don't involve hysterical concerns about apartments being build next to historic zones.
ALX and ARL peeps - anyone watched fireworks from Long Bridge Park off Crystal City? Mobbed? Blocked off in any way? Workable if you get there soon enough? Other considerations?
Assemblymember @buffywicks.bsky.social did something that was long believed to be impossible. Absolutely remarkable pro-housing leadership!
But as things stands, this means that all other infill housing, from single-family homes on up to five-over-one apartments, are exempt from CEQA, without all the usual caveats or burdens. It's hard to overstate how much easier it could soon be to build housing in California.
The impossible has become possible: we've passed a clean CEQA infill exemption. This is probably the most important thing California has done on housing in the present YIMBY moment.
"To the NIMBY movement that is now being replaced by the YIMBY movement, I say: Go YIMBYs!" @gavinnewsom.bsky.social
In 2023, YIMBYs in Montana passed a historic slate of pro-housing legislation. In 2024, it led to a surge in housing permitting, even as national markets tanked. In 2025, housing costs are falling. Building housing works. montanafreepress.org/2025/06/23/h...
Pro tip: put them down and touch grass instead
BIG NEWS: The Legislature passed our major CEQA reform & affordability legislation, SB 131: SB 131 cuts down on unnecessary process — often having nothing to do with the environment — that makes it harder & more expensive to build housing, advanced manufacturing, child care centers, broadband … 🧵
Focus on voters' overriding economic concerns! What a concept! First party that executes on that with discipline will win SO BIG.
[The Ezra Klein Show] Sarah McBride on Why the Left Lost on Trans Rights 🅴 #theEzraKleinShow dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3... via @podcastaddict.bsky.social The first 24ish minutes of this is legitimately great and a good antidote to Robin DiAngelo
The singularity is awesome
Thanks Bonnie!
Thank you!!!
My dear wife has self-published a book of obscure antonyms with elegant, whimsical illustrations by her sister. "The Book of Contradictions" is a reminder to us as adults not to place artificial limits on children. a.co/d/1UpjxWH
Bike!
